The Captain and The Soldier - Stucky Drabbles
by Miarka
Summary: A collection of Stucky drabbles I've been meaning to publish for months. Could be taken as a sequel to my 'Coming back around' one shot but also works as a stand alone. Please read and review. Enjoy.
1. Chapter 1

"Just because he's your boyfriend now Steve doesn't excuse the fact the he was previously a master assassin."

Maria Hill could speak with a voice that chilled like ice when she wanted too, and now seemed a good time to get serious, with extra emphasis on the 'boyfriend' part because she knew Steve would hate it.

Sure enough he did and glared back at her, an expression met with equal anger on her part.

"He's not the winter soldier anymore." Steve growled in a low voice.

"For God's sakes, Steve." She muttered, breaking the staring contest game and glancing out the window in exasperation. "He's changed his name, that won't change him overnight."

Steve was quiet for a long time, for so long that Hill began to wonder if he'd slipped quietly out of her office. But when she turned around she found Steve still rooted to the same spot in front of her desk, now with eyes cast to the floor.

"I know it's still in him." Steve said in a small voice and raised his head. "I know he'll never be the same, I accept that, but I'm gonna do my best to make him better, no matter what. And you poking around at him isn't gonna make things better, that's why I need you to leave him be."

"Steve, I'm sorry." Hill replied, her voice going a little softer as she turned away from the window and walked to stand on the other side of her desk to Steve. "But he's a dangerous criminal, wanted for countless reasons, and I can't let him out into the world without fully knowing what he's capable of. Standard enemy procedure means he must go through all the tests."

"Enough with the damn tests already." Steve said, exasperated himself now. He sighed and turned his head, staring into a corner of Hill's office. "Maria, please?" He begged taking a step forward so they were as close as they could be with the desk between them. "Call it a favour. Don't you owe me?"

Now it was Hill's turn to sigh. Damn it Rodgers, he'd got her there. She knew all too well how he'd been tracking down Bucky for months before he showed up, yet he still came back to SHIELD, if she asked him too. It wasn't that he liked it, that he liked being Captain America and showing up to save the day, it was that Steve was a good guy. He knew how precarious SHIELD was right now and Hill knew she could rely on Steve to come back if he was called, even in she herself didn't like calling him, they simply had no other options.

"Rough day?" Steve asked as Hill sat herself in her chair and rubbed her forehead.

She glanced a small smile up at him. She knew all too well how he was playing this game; he knew all her days were hard right now; it was just a distraction from the real conversation.

"The worst." She lied in return, deciding to play along.

"You regret coming back?" He asked softly, his good guy smile and caring voice oozing out of him as usual.

She shook her head. "Nah, I couldn't have spent another minute with Stark making bad jokes and patronising me." She told him, and then added softly. "Besides, Nick trusted me to take over where he left off."

A silence fell between them in the room, not an uncomfortable silence, more one of reflection.

"I'll have records forged that Barns went through all of the tests." Hill said finally in a professional voice and straightened up. "It's take a few strings to pull but I can do it."

Steve just stared at her in disbelief. In this time Hill pulled out her tablet and started typing away with it on her desk.

"I'll put him under your supervision for a year, you have jurisdiction to do this as a SHEILD agent. Failure to keep him in control under your supervision will result in him being put into lockdown at a secure facility, and need I mention consequences for you too. We'll review his progress one year from his realise and evaluate if he's still a threat to society. If he is, it's further treatment in lockdown, if he's not, then god help us he gets an all clear and is allowed to go his way in the world, provided will still monitor him from a distance." Hill said neatly before standing up. "Simply put, you're his babysitter for a year. Make sure he stays out of trouble."

Steve produced the biggest grin Hill thought she'd ever seen on him, maybe on anyone else ever in fact. "I can't thank you enough, Maria."

"Don't thank me just yet. This is over making us evens; you owe me big time for this one now." She answered in a stern voice though she couldn't help but let a smile creep in, the joy of the Captain right now was infectious.

"I'll take the price." He said with a smile.

* * *

"Steve." Bucky gave a desperate gasp and bolted up from the corner of the cell he'd been hunched over in as Steve walked him to collect him.

Steve opened his arms to his best friend and the gesture was gratefully accepted.

"Come on now." Steve mumbled as he held the other man tight. "It's time for us to go home."

Bucky pulled back, staring in disbelief. "I don't have a home." He muttered.

"You're gonna live with me now." Steve answered, putting on a smile for him.

"They let you do that?" He asked.

"Sure did." Said Steve. "Unless you'd like to stay here."

Bucky shook his head violently, he didn't like it here. Steve had assured him that these were good people, SHIELD were the good guys he'd said. But he couldn't believe him, not when they put him on a hospital bed and agents in white uniform checked out everything they could find about his physical and mental ability. His arm alone they'd spent hours studying, and then spent even longer on his mind. Bucky felt sick, angry and exhausted just thinking about it.

"Good." Steve said quietly. He drew one arm around Bucky, that felt right, and guided him towards the door. Then he stopped, leaned in and gave him a quick kiss on the forehead, that felt even more right. "Let's go home."


	2. Chapter 2

"I don't get it, Steve. We're moving in two weeks and you're taking me shopping?"

"Lighten up. There's never a bad time to go shopping. Besides you can't keep borrowing my clothes." Steve replied as Bucky frowned at him from beneath the dark drapes of his long hair.

"You sound just like the girls I used to date….back then, you know." He replied giving a little jerky nod. He didn't like speaking out about the war or much else before his time under the ice, he simply referred to it as 'back then' and Steve understood. "And why not? I like your clothes." He said, glancing down at smart button up shirt and jacket Steve had put him in, fumbling with the material.

"Because they are my clothes." Steve said, eyeing his best friend and wishing he wouldn't do that. "Geez Buck, you're calling me a dame, don't act like some overly attached girlfriend." He countered, trying to laugh it off. "Now come on." He said dragging him round the huge clothing store. "Let's get you some of your own clothes."

* * *

But Bucky went slowly, dragging his one flesh hand across every piece of clothing he could touch. When they passed through the woman's section Steve kept on walking ahead and then having turn back to fetch Bucky who was slowly dragging his hand along some garment made of silk or velvet.

"It's velvet. People rarely had stuff like this back then. It was too expensive to get, what with all the shipping risks and rations." Steve told him as he approached Bucky again for the third time.

"I remember. Your mother had a velvet dress from years before; she rarely wore it, only on very special occasions. I only ever saw her wear it once, it always made me feel kinda sad that something so beautiful was so hardly used." He shrugged and then smirked. "I remember the first time I saw it, we were just kids, you bragged about your mother owning a velvet dress and showed me, even though you weren't supposed to touch it. When she caught us looking at the thing she scolded us both and then we ran down to the other end of the street and stayed there all afternoon to escape her."

When Bucky looked back up from the fabric Steve was staring at him. "I'd forgotten about that."

Bucky smirked and rolled his shoulders back the way he always did when he tried to lighten things. "What can I say, they can't chain me."

And then the moment died because even when Bucky joked about what had happened to him, being the winter soldier, being under the ice, being a slave, which was rare in itself, Steve became dead serious because he couldn't forgive himself for a crime he'd never committed.

A silence filled between them, an uncomfortable one unbroken by rattle of people around them in the store and the jingling music flowing unendingly from the speakers. It was unbroken until Bucky realised his grasp from the velvet dress and dropped his hand to entwine his fingers with Steve's.

Steve glanced down to his fingers encased in Bucky's and then back up to Bucky's face.

"Come on." Bucky said, giving Steve's hand a squeeze. "Take me shopping."

* * *

"Black Sabbath, what does that even mean? Why would someone want to darken the Sabbath day?" Bucky asked staring confused at one of the many band t-shirts in the men's department.

"It's a band, Buck." Steve said chuckling. "Tony likes them."

"Oh does Tony? Well then we've all got to like them." Bucky replied with sarcasm and cheek.

"Hey it's not like that, the guy annoys me too. I just know that he has a t-shirt of them, I saw him wearing it once, so I assume he likes them."

"I don't get it, are we all Anti-Christ worshippers now?"

"No, people have just become a lot more….artistic in the past seventy years."

"Still it just doesn't feel right."

"Well I don't know if you remember but I'm the one who made you drag your butt of to church every Sunday, you hated going."

"No it's not that." Bucky replied turning away with a dark look. "It's here, being here doesn't feel right. I'm still lost, Steve."

"Hey it's okay." Said Steve, darting around from the other side of the clothing rack and coming close to Bucky.

"No don't say that." Bucky snapped. "Because it's not okay. I'm not okay."

"I know." Steve said finally, his voice a little shaky. "I know you're not okay Buck. I'm not wholly either. I can't expect to be and I'm not asking you to be. Hey look at me." He said clasping his hands over Bucky's, the one with warm skin and the one covered by a leather glove beneath which lay cold metal, Steve loved both, Steve loved all of Bucky, broken as he was. That got Bucky's attention, those icy blue eyes stared back at Steve and he almost lost his words for a second. "Listen, I'm never going to ask anything of you, anything at all. You just find your way back, and I'll stand right beside you as you do."

For a moment Steve thought he'd got Bucky off the angst train but then the dark-haired man pulled free of his grasp and ducked underneath the rails, hiding among the shirts.

"Bucky." Steve moaned in exasperation before ducking into the clothes as well.

He found himself crouching low as he was squeezed together between prints of many colours, Bucky was there too, his face inches away from Steve's in the small space.

"Bucky, please, we can't be here. Com-"

But his words were cut short as Bucky leaned forward and grabbed Steve; his hands cupped on his neck, and planted a kiss on Steve's mouth.

"Okay, you have my complete attention." Steve mumbled when Bucky pulled away.

"Steve, what are we going to do? I'm a mess. And we can't be like this."

"Like what?" Steve asked, with a confused stare.

"Like this." Bucky said, looking at him and pressing his forehead into the other mans. Steve understood. "We can't, I mean you're Captain America and I'm…well I don't even know, but I know it's nothing good. Even if you tell it's fine now, for people to be like this, it doesn't mean people will be fine with us."

"Screw people." Steve replied abruptly, a little surprised that he'd said it himself. "Ever since I woke caring about other people is all I've done, don't we get something for once? Bucky" He shifted, legs growing awkward and tired from crouching "do you realise I could have almost any of those people but I only want one. I only want you."

This time it was Bucky's turn to be cut off, as he opened his mouth for a quick reply it was suddenly met with the taste of Steve on them as the captain pressed his lips against the soldier's.

Steve sighed as pulled back and rested his forehead on Bucky's once again. "We've waited a long time for this, Buck. I won't let it slip away from me for the world."

Bucky glanced up at him, looking like he was going to say something else, then in true Bucky fashion he abruptly completely changed the subject. "What's this one?" He asked Steve, pulling back the gap in the shirts slightly to reveal a grey printed tee.

Steve looked over at it. "Guns n' Roses." He replied "Another band."

"One that Tony likes?" Bucky replied mockingly.

"I don't know." Steve said with a smile. "They have a few good songs, you'd probably like them. Come on." He said and pulled himself out the other side of the clothing rack; Bucky followed and took the t-shirt off the rail, studying the printed logo.

"It's what they all call rock 'n' roll. It suits you."

"How so?"

"Oh, the hair, the dark and angsty attitude. You've already got the look you just need the clothes." Steve replied with a teasing voice.

Bucky smiled as usual, genuinely even though it was still a smirk. For some reason Bucky was reluctant to get his hair cut, even after he'd got back, he had it washed and was well looked after by Steve but had never once shown interest in taking a trip to a barbers shop. It was like a small part of the wild winter soldier that he refused to cut off. Steve had never questioned him about it, he secretly adored it.

"I need some long sleeved shirts too." Bucky said.

Steve nodded understandingly. Although he'd tried to convince Bucky that there was nothing wrong with showing his metal arm Bucky was having none of it. He didn't dare go out without a jacket or long sleeved shirt covering his arm and a leather glove permanently on the hand. It was the part of him that he couldn't change, couldn't escape from and he hated it, no matter how hard Steve tried to convince him otherwise. It was stronger, more advanced than prosthetic arms. It reminded Bucky that he was different and it filled him with regret of a time he'd lost.

Neither of the two men said anything about this, but they both knew they were thinking on it. Finally Bucky cleared his throat. "Well come on, Steve, like I said we haven't got all the time in the world if in two weeks we're going to be living in New York."


End file.
